Theaetetus:Drew: I was never quite clear on what the deal was here. Perhaps you could help explain how it works on the other end. Basically, we didn't infringe on this patent. I realize the courts require evidence of infringement, but apparently they don't up front because the troll didn't provide any. They just said "Fark's infringing and needs to cease immediately" without providing anything else in the complaint.

Yeah, nothing more than an accusation is required up front to file the suit. But similarly, your answer to the complaint requires nothing more than "Fark, Inc. denies the allegations in the complaint, requests a jury trial, and suggests the plaintiff go pound sand." Take a look at Facebook's answer in the Yahoo-Facebook dispute, for example (they went on to counterclaim infringement of 10 of their patents, but the answer in the first half is basically a blanket denial of everything).The court won't order an injunction, based on the complaint and answer, however. The plaintiff would have to move for summary judgement and the injunction, and at that point, they have to provide sufficient evidence, or the court can tell them to pound sand.

Think of the complaint as being like a criminal indictment... The DA can call you a murderer all they want, but you don't have to respond with anything more than "nuh huh" until they've provided some evidence.

Since Twombly and Iqbal though, aren't the federal pleading requirements closer to fact pleading now-a-days? Couldn't Drew's same goal here have been reached by filing a 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss? And if that is the case, why in the world wouldn't the other companies have done this before trying to settle?

Theaetetus:Do the needful: Drew, I wish you would have used One Click Purchases as an example of bad patents.

Did you know that Oreilly took back his $10,000 bounty for prior art for the One-click patent, conceding that it couldn't be found and that the patent was likely valid?

I wasn't aware of that. My point of view is merely as a software developer. To me it is an issue of copyright vs. patents, and I feel strongly that you should not be allowed to patent a piece of software. Software is not something tangible like a door knob. I don't have the ability to explain it, but if I code up a way for you to click a button and checkout and pay for your product, in my mind the only thing I can prevent other people from doing is copying my code line for line. If someone else puts up a button to check out with one click and programs it completely different, the concept is the same but the method is completely different. For instance my door knob. I have no problem with someone protecting their design of a door knob, but they can't patent opening the door. Which as a software developer I feel the patent laws do. Software should be governed by copyright laws. Patents are for tangible items in my opinion. You would never see someone trying to patent a book on murder mystery, but there sits Amazon with a patent on a coding concept.

Mouhamad A. NaboulsiLess than 5 minutes ago: It is very apparent that the speaker lives in the present and has no vision. Yes, sending news via e-mail is trivial "TODAY", but it was not when the patent was filed or issued.

If they stopped letting retarded people on the Internet it would be empty

That guy's pretty much all wrong. Sending news via email was some kind of innovation in 1999 eh? Right.

Anyhow, I'm not anti-patent, inventors should be protected. When they actually invent something that is

Another gem of a comment from this guy. (new window)

Also did a LinkedIn search on him. Odd work history... (new window)

Yeah, that comment from him on the other story is really wacky.

He takes personal offense to the term "patent troll", saying that Trolls are from Sweden, and he is not, so he can't be a patent troll, and admitting he uses "patent troll" tactics but saying it's unfair to have a pejorative term for them.

In other words Mouhamad A. Naboulsi is a huge patent troll farktard who is scared of any change in the patent system which will upset his gravy train.

Do the needful:My point of view is merely as a software developer. To me it is an issue of copyright vs. patents, and I feel strongly that you should not be allowed to patent a piece of software. Software is not something tangible like a door knob.

Yes, but patents don't require something tangible like a door knob: machine, article of manufacture, composition of matter... or a method. Even business methods are explicitly patentable.

I don't have the ability to explain it, but if I code up a way for you to click a button and checkout and pay for your product, in my mind the only thing I can prevent other people from doing is copying my code line for line.

Yes, and that means that, in reality, you can't do anything to protect your software against anyone but pirates and counterfeiters. If it's commercially worth it to me to copy, then I'll hire a team in Russia or India to reverse engineer it and code their own. It's not copied, so you have no copyright protections.Copyright is useful if only the original expression is valuable - a specific movie, a specific song, a specific program - which means usually it's going to be helpful only in protecting artistic works. Commercially valuable things, however, are valuable regardless of the specific expression, and in fact are more valuable when they can be used in myriad locations and environments. Copyright simply won't protect your work.

If someone else puts up a button to check out with one click and programs it completely different, the concept is the same but the method is completely different. For instance my door knob. I have no problem with someone protecting their design of a door knob, but they can't patent opening the door. Which as a software developer I feel the patent laws do. Software should be governed by copyright laws. Patents are for tangible items in my opinion. You would never see someone trying to patent a book on murder mystery, but there sits Amazon with a patent on a coding concept.

Yes, but you would see someone trying to patent methods for curing rubber, methods for multiplexing communications, methods for transmitting push email to mobile devices, and yes, methods for a shopping-cartless checkout method, and these protect implementations of the root concepts, regardless of the specific code used.

I'm downloading this right now in (fake Russian accent) GLORIOUS HI-DEFINITION VIDEO (end fake Russian accent)! I'll stream it over to my TV, but I swear if my TV breaks afterwards because it can't handle the enormous amounts of awesome, I'm e-mailing Vizio to tell them to get me a new one!

impaler:I'm an R&D engineer, and my company files for a lot of patents.

For me, that was a rhetorical question (note that it wasn't answered by the person it was directed to). Not at all surprised by what you say. We don't hate the USPTO because it's fun or a hobby, it's because it's farking ruining our work. It's sad and such a waste of time. And despite what was claimed here there are in fact "phone on internet" patents issued STILL. No, not complex management systems or testing devices, there are those too, just farking VOIP.

I didn't refer to any "study", so I don't know what you mean. If the study was where Drew's numbers came from, take it up with him. He just told a huge audience (including the internet) those things, so you should speak up clearly if those numbers are false.

Also looking at "the recent stuff" (I'm assuming you mean patents issued this year) isn't "recent". I'm not sure what the average is, but the stuff I'm allowing now has EFDs ranging from 2003-2005.

Seven to nine years. You must be proud. Look, I had a job at a shiat place once too, I needed the money and had no other options, but I didn't go around defending their shiattyness on the internet.

This reminds me so much of the thread from a month or so ago with the CPA telling everyone the tax code was perfectly simple, anyone could grasp it, it was written in "plain English".

Theaetetus:Do the needful: I don't have the ability to explain it, but if I code up a way for you to click a button and checkout and pay for your product, in my mind the only thing I can prevent other people from doing is copying my code line for line.

Yes, and that means that, in reality, you can't do anything to protect your software against anyone but pirates and counterfeiters. If it's commercially worth it to me to copy, then I'll hire a team in Russia or India to reverse engineer it and code their own. It's not copied, so you have no copyright protections.Copyright is useful if only the original expression is valuable - a specific movie, a specific song, a specific program - which means usually it's going to be helpful only in protecting artistic works. Commercially valuable things, however, are valuable regardless of the specific expression, and in fact are more valuable when they can be used in myriad locations and environments. Copyright simply won't protect your work.

While I agree with what you are saying, I think my point of view is just focused on software because that's my background. I see the points here, but think that there is the severe capability to stifle creativity using patents. I have been involved in a couple of copyright issues based on software so it's not completely out of the realm to say that copyright won't protect your software. There is an Onion article about Microsoft patenting ones and zeros that I think did a good job of satirizing the whole issue.

So out of curiosity, how do authors prevent someone from taking their book, changing the names, maybe locations, enough to make it not the same, but using the same framework? That's the problem I see with software. You patent one click shopping for your website, but my website might be able to pull off one click shopping with completely different parameters from a code point of view.

I do realize I am peeing into the wind here, and woefully ill equipped to argue my point. Not to mention trying to type out feelings is almost pointless but it's just a feeling that I have, and I know other do as well based on the uproar when it happened. This will all be interesting to see played out by the people involved as we further head down this digital path. At least we all agree that patent trolls need to be squeezed till they pop.

Copyright trolls are just as bad. Except there are statutory damage caps, but even then, they sometimes manage to litigate for more beyond those caps. Had to deal with a copyright troll myself through my own business who wanted to try to sue me for willful copyright infringement. I only ever had initial dealings with the attorney. No intital "hey you are using my shiat. stop using my shiat or I will seek an attorney". It was very random and out of the blue.

The artwork in question was used on my business website and a companion website that was selling t-shirts with specific logos that I had created. Any photos in the artwork were taken by myself or my husband and subsequent edits or manipulation was done solely by me. Not only that, they were attempting to only go after one website with the images in question but not the other that had the t-shirts with the same images. My last communication to the attorney was basically "bring it". And I told the only thing he would get out of me was "a wad of pocket lint, a steaming pile of shiat and two cats that puke all the time."

Once they realized I was a dead end financially, I never heard from them again. I did some tracking on the "client" who was attempting to come after me.... and like Drew's nemesis, this guy's address ended up being an address at some hole in the wall strip mall and no employees as well. I also found out he was originally from India as well. Welcome to the land of the free and opportunistic gravy train of lawsuits.

So Drew is right. If you make it clear up front you have no money, they will, most often, give up in pursuing a lawsuit or be quick to try and settle for anything they think they can get out of you and move on.

Do the needful:I had thought about holding my phone up near the speaker and offering to text it to you. It's scary that something that painfully obvious is overlooked. Sorry to hear about find out about your hearing loss. YouTube should put that software they have that searches out songs you have put in your video to at least try and voice to text subtitles for the hearing impaired. Do you have software that will hook into your soundcard stream? Then it could be used on any site.

Most speech recognition programs typically needs to 'learn' a voice or accent to be more accurate to what they're saying. Even Google's youtube voice recognition program really sucks.

try it some time, Go to youtube, pick a random video and click on the CC button and then click on the transcribe audio button. It's ridiculously inaccurate.

We're at least 5 years or so away from a good voice recognition algorithm.

Unless if there's something I'm not aware of and I'd like to know since it would be pretty relevant to my interests.

CrispFlows:Most speech recognition programs typically needs to 'learn' a voice or accent to be more accurate to what they're saying. Even Google's youtube voice recognition program really sucks.

try it some time, Go to youtube, pick a random video and click on the CC button and then click on the transcribe audio button. It's ridiculously inaccurate.

We're at least 5 years or so away from a good voice recognition algorithm.

Unless if there's something I'm not aware of and I'd like to know since it would be pretty relevant to my interests.

I wasn't aware youtube had that. But I will go give it a try. I know that my phone has "voice recognition" and sometime my textes/texts/texteses look like a total random smattering of words. I sometimes hit send just to confuse the recipient.

impaler:Bacontastesgood: Why do so many ACTUAL inventors hate the USPTO? Any theories on that? There must be a reason.

I'm an R&D engineer, and my company files for a lot of patents. For us its a defense mechanism, because almost anything of any complexity you make will unintentionally violate some patent. This goes to the ease at which one can get a patent for something that is obvious. Now that lawyer above was incredulous that the VoIP patent was obvious. But the patent system isn't what ignorant laymen like him see to be obvious. For that one, it would be computer engineers like myself that get to make the judgement. Not only is that patent "obvious," I can not even think of any other way to do it. In fact, any design for VoIP that is NOT like that one, would be the non-obivous patentable innovation.

Large companies use the patent system to squash competition. Large companies often fight each other, simultaneously claiming the other is violating their patent on the same technology. It's a tool for an innovation plutocracy.

LoL. You don't want to make an inherency argument. You'll lose. I can think of another way to do it. Perform the IP conversion at any other network node other than the central office, like say.... the end user's device.

Under KSR you can also make a finite possible solution argument as well. But that's only really applicable when the differences between prior art and the claimed invention are so small they're pretty much a design choice. And you still have to articulate the finite set of solutions and prove them predictable.

nickerj1:LoL. You don't want to make an inherency argument. You'll lose. I can think of another way to do it. Perform the IP conversion at any other network node other than the central office, like say.... the end user's device.

Theaetetus:The fact that you can't find any evidence from before the filing date of the patent and instead have to rely on your hindsight, more than a decade later, to claim it was supposedly obvious at the time doesn't make me an "ignorant layman".

The reason there's no prior art, is not because the idea was so novel, it's because the computational power and networking speed didn't exist yet.

impaler:I didn't call you names. I said you were an ignorant layman when it comes to computer engineering. You are. When it comes to law I'm an ignorant layman.

[snort]I'm not calling you an ignorant layman... I'm just saying that I've designed more complex and greater numbers of computer systems than you've ever touched.

I am, however, calling you a troll, which is why you're going on ignore. You've added absolutely nothing to this conversation. I mean, really:

impaler:The reason there's no prior art, is not because the idea was so novel, it's because the computational power and networking speed didn't exist yet.

... as noted above, Jules Verne is prior art for time machines, even though he had no "computational power and networking speed". Your objections show you have no understanding of what you're talking about. Your insults show you have no willingness to learn. So, you're not worth any more time in either case.

Theaetetus:Do the needful: Drew, I wish you would have used One Click Purchases as an example of bad patents.

Did you know that Oreilly took back his $10,000 bounty for prior art for the One-click patent, conceding that it couldn't be found and that the patent was likely valid?

Bezos is on record (last month's Wired Magazine interview) stating that he would happily give up that patent if the entire patent system went away. He feels the flaws in the system far outweigh the benefits. In short, he recognizes that it may be a valid patent, but that the idea of it is somewhat ridiculous, and it is the system, rather than the benefits of the system, that forces Amazon to file for these kinds of patents.

Theaetetus:Yes, and that means that, in reality, you can't do anything to protect your software against anyone but pirates and counterfeiters. If it's commercially worth it to me to copy, then I'll hire a team in Russia or India to reverse engineer it and code their own. It's not copied, so you have no copyright protections.

True Fact: Samsung's mobil unit has a guy with the title "Director of Reverse Engineering."

I've been in meetings with him in Korea. I don't think they realize what that means over here.

impaler:Theaetetus: The fact that you can't find any evidence from before the filing date of the patent and instead have to rely on your hindsight, more than a decade later, to claim it was supposedly obvious at the time doesn't make me an "ignorant layman".

The reason there's no prior art, is not because the idea was so novel, it's because the computational power and networking speed didn't exist yet.

You do not need to show an implementation, or even that an implementation is possible in order to secure a patent.

Rent Party:You do not need to show an implementation, or even that an implementation is possible in order to secure a patent.

And that right there is a big problem with patents.

Perfectly illustrated in the VoIP patent. As they described it, it wouldn't have worked in 95, and it would be a terrible design today.

The patent said to send the data "over TCP or UDP, the protocols of the Internet." Well! Thanks for that suggestion! Except in 95, any time sensitive data stream the size of a voice transmission could have easily been stalled by one packet being dropped or hung up on a router. Even today that type of information isn't sent TCP. Yet not one explanation how to deal with that problem.

Time sensitive information also can't be stalled at the source. No mention of how to time divide the analog stream into usable chunks, or how to deal with delays with compression. They don't even list good compression algorithms to use. If you want 100ms delay at a minimum, not even counting RTT, you have to send at least 10 packets per second. With TCP, that is a minimum of 3.2 kbps from just the overhead of the packets. A sizable chunk in 95.

Oh! But it did say "some other compression" could be used amongst the inadequate compression schemes they listed. Now that is the sort of "non obvious" innovation I expect in a patent!

All that patent stated was analog voice data had to be digitized (no way around that), put into packet to be sent over IP (no way around that), and recomposed to be sent over a PSTN (no way around that).

Again, not only is that patent "obvious," it is literally the only way it can be done. and it doesn't even give a single solution to the many problems that need to be solved to do VoIP! Wait, I take that back. It did say some sort of compression they didn't bother to list could be used.

There's a reason why people that make money off of innovation, such as R&D engineers like myself, even Amazon CEOs, think the patent system is broke, and patent lawyers like Theaetetus think it isn't.

Do I know WTF I'm talking about? this is the abstract to a patent I hold. Provide your patent abstracts Theaetetus.

The present application relates to an implementation of a reliable transport protocol that provides receiver-based congestion control within a computing system. An exemplary system includes a first network device and a second network device within a network. During a handshake procedure, a transmission rate at which data can be sent as well as an acceptable corruptive loss rate for a data path between the first network device and the second network device in the network is determined. The second network device then receives data sent from the first network device at the transmission rate. When the acceptable corruptive loss rate for received data has been exceeded, the second network device determines an amount by which to reduce the transmission rate, and then sends a notification to the first network device indicating the amount by which to reduce the transmission rate for subsequently transmitted data.

Rent Party:Bezos is on record (last month's Wired Magazine interview) stating that he would happily give up that patent if the entire patent system went away. He feels the flaws in the system far outweigh the benefits. In short, he recognizes that it may be a valid patent, but that the idea of it is somewhat ridiculous, and it is the system, rather than the benefits of the system, that forces Amazon to file for these kinds of patents.

impaler:I'm an R&D engineer, and my company files for a lot of patents. For us its a defense mechanism

Yep.

PS: By "my company" I mean "the company I work for." I'm an employee, not an owner. I see how that might be misleading after rereading it.

Theaetetus:impaler: I didn't call you names. I said you were an ignorant layman when it comes to computer engineering. You are. When it comes to law I'm an ignorant layman.

[snort]I'm not calling you an ignorant layman... I'm just saying that I've designed more complex and greater numbers of computer systems than you've ever touched.

No, I am calling you an ignorant layman. And I could have easily designed more complex and greater numbers of computer systems than you've ever touched.

It is odd though, even after I said I was an "ignorant layman" with respect to law, you never brought up how "obvious" is a legal definition that an ignorant layman like myself doesn't fully understand (which is entirely reasonable), but rather you try to argue the only viable high level architecture for VoIP wouldn't have been obvious to an engineer in 95, all the while being completely and ignorantly unaware none of the technologies described int the patent (mostly because it was so high-level) have changed significantly since 95.

Code written for a UDP tunnel in 95, would be no different today, with the exception of accounting for NAT, which has shat all to do with that patent.

Theaetetus:ohknaks: Theaetetus: Secondly, the "frivolous" patents you mention at the beginning - phone calls, but on the internet; or radio, but for cell phones - don't actually exist. Those are just paraphrased descriptions of what the patent roughly describes, but that's like saying that Toyota's Prius transmission patents are really just patenting "a car, but with electricity!"

I present to you patent 6,243,373 (new window) "Method and apparatus for implementing a computer network/Internet telephone system,", which is pretty much 'phone calls, but on the internet'.

Nice paraphrased description. But no, that may be a rough statement of what the patent loosely describes, but it's not what the patent claims, which is:1. A method of routing a full duplex telephone call between a first telephone set and a second telephone set using a public computer network as at least part of a communication link connecting said first and second telephone sets, comprising the steps of:Method of connecting a phone call with a computer.receiving at a first computer network access port a first telephone call from a central office placed from said fist telephone set initiating said full duplex telephone call, said first telephone call specifying a telephone number of said second telephone set, without specifying additional telephone destinations;The caller's phone calls a phone number, and the call gets routed to a computerconverting data received from the central office to an Intenet protocol;The phone call is converted to data with one of those newfangled "modem" thingiesestablishing a communication link over said public computer network between said first computer network access port and a remote second computer network access port;The computer talks to another computer over a network.placing a second telephone call from said second computer network access port to said second telephone set using a PSTN;The second computer uses a modem thingy to call out to the destination numberconverting data received from the public computer network from Intenet protocol to a PSTN protocol; andThe modem demodulates the data stream back to the phone networkconnecting said first telephone call, said communication link and said second telephone call to thereby establish a telephone call between said first telephone set and said second telephone set.The phone call is now established

There's more limitations there than just "internet ...

Bolded are my simplified descriptions.It's less limited than just "internet" it's any phone call from a phone that goes through a computer network and has a format conversion step. This is every phone call over the internet, over a LAN, etc.